Saw this all in news reports on Goth culture in the 90s. I’m sure they had ones for Punks, Hippies, and Beatniks too. Reactionary warning about a “teen phenomenon.” Checklist of what to look for to make sure your kids aren’t emo. Ultra-square news anchors with helmet-hair & crisp suits making disapproving faces. And panicked parents interrogating their children afterwards: “are you emo?! don’t you know that emo can kill?!”

The sock monkey in question is produced by TheSockObama.com, who claims that the toy is just the result of a “casual and affectionate observation one night, and a charming association between a candidate and a toy we had when we were little.”

But some New York readers are not amused, with some commentors suggesting that the attorney general of Utah, the state where the sock monkeys are produced, should be notified. Another reader comments:

“As an African-American boomer, I have to give them an “A” for cleverness and cunning. During (legalized) Segregation in the South, when I visited Mobile, AL during the Summers — I went through the looking glass and experienced a world filled with nuance, double entrendre and African-Americans having to pretend demeaning imagery was funny. In other words, we had to be “in” on the joke or there was something wrong with us.”

But, other readers disagree, saying that this is “much ado about nothing”:

“The SockObama happens to look very cute. It is just your usual sock monkey with an Obama haircut and a suit. It does in fact look a bit like Obama, and Obama does in fact look rather like a sock monkey. What is your problem? Get over it!”